Illumination

Two years ago today, as dawn was breaking, the light went out in my life. My wife, Amy, died after a short, but intense struggle with Covid. As the days folded into weeks and weeks into months and now months into two years, I have longed for the time when it all gets easier. I’m still waiting. As I wait, I have become more attuned to the snatches of light that briefly illuminate the path and beckon me forward. I’ve come to realize that in the darkest moments, the most minute light casts an outsized glow.

There are blocks of time in those early weeks and months that evade my memory. Many of the vaporous recollections after Amy’s death are reflective of the late night, shadowy world between dreams and consciousness, - difficult to discern what is real or imagined. I sometimes walk through the basement of our home, now just my home, and recall a hazy image of preparing to give her eulogy. Did that really happen?  Or I “see” her standing at the workbench I built, the one she thought was too big and took up too much space, sorting through her quilting cloth and telling me how glad she was that I built that table.

As the months passed, I grew increasingly concerned that I would forget the details of Amy – the texture of her hair or the smell of her lotion – the way she sang all parts of Bohemian Rhapsody gloriously off key. I woke with a start one morning with the realization that I couldn’t remember the sound of her voice. I had saved her voicemail message from her phone, but it sounded too mechanical – almost metallic –familiar, but not her voice. But, when I hear her daughter, Taylor, shouting encouragement and guidance to her son Liam when he is playing ball, I can hear Amy’s voice as clear as spring water. I recently heard Amy’s sister, Dawn, speak a phrase and recalled Amy using those same words. Words that penetrate the darkness.

Central Park, NYC January 2020

Often, I find myself wishing to relive a moment with Amy. Oddly, it is rarely a desire to revisit warm memories. I hold those tightly and can feel all their details. No, the times I want to go back to are those when I disappointed her or let her down in some way – a desire to make amends. Two days before she died, Amy’s condition was worsening, and she was deeply depressed. She asked me sit with her and tell her a story. This was something of a game we played. I love to tell stories and she loved listening to them. But that night, I was so concerned for her that I couldn’t conjure even the simplest story. When I told her I couldn’t think of one to tell, she whispered, “That’s okay.” I realize now that Amy didn’t need to be entertained as much as she needed me to attend to her – to provide a momentary distraction from the fear that she was dying.

When I visit Amy’s grave, I usually carry a small stone from somewhere I’ve been – a hike, a trip, working in the yard - and I tell her the story of finding that stone. Most recently, it was a hen-egg sized, red, rounded stone from a creek bed in southwestern Wyoming. The stone was polished as it rolled about inside a glacier that crept down the valley before being left behind as the glacial ice inched back up the mountain. The stone had laid there in Cottonwood Creek, washed over by thousands of years of pulsing water. As I walked the creek bed, the wet stone reflected a sunbeam from the late summer sun.  In that reflection, as Amy would have said, the stone “spoke to me.” I told Amy that story as I placed it in the center of her tombstone when I returned home.

That is my experience with grief.

 

 

 

One in a Million

 

As we approach the threshold of one million deaths from Covid in the United States, it is easy to get lost in the incomprehensible vastness of one million people. This is especially true for those of us who live in rural areas. As those numbers climb, I lose the ability to relate to that many people. Perhaps in makes more sense to consider one of a million.

My wife, Amy, was diagnosed with Covid on October 2, 2020. We went to the emergency department at a hospital in a neighboring county that evening. Amy’s oxygen levels were low but stable. She was given a prescription for steroids and sent home. Over the next days she improved slightly but crashed on October 7^th. She died the next day at age 55. She was one in a million.

 

Amy’s death was jarring. I never envisioned offering her eulogy. I stumbled and crashed my way through months of mental and emotional fog that still rolls over me when I least expect it. I’ve questioned God and tried to understand His sovereign will. I often feel lost and alone and empty and rudderless. I am one in a million whose life has been changed forever.

Over the past 18 months I have endured social media videos of precious little children trick or treating, dressed as the Coronavirus; listened to “experts” tout the healing properties of horse wormer; seen “proud Americans standing up for freedom” dragged from commercial jets because they refuse to wear masks; listened as pundits politicized pain and hurt; and heard skeptics attribute those million deaths to preexisting conditions as though it was Amy’s own fault that she died. Unfortunately, ours is just one of a million other families who have been forced to drink this cocktail of anger, disbelief, selfishness and individualism.

Amy’s five-year-old grandson, Liam, has cycled through a season of soccer, t-ball, flag football, and basketball since her death, and is now starting that seasonal succession once again. Amy loved sports and longingly anticipated the day when Liam would begin playing. When Liam looks to the sidelines or into the bleachers, he sees many of his family cheering him on. But he doesn’t see his Gigi filming every play and shouting encouragement. Liam is one in a million who sees an empty seat that should be filled by a loved one.

 

I am fortunate to be embraced by family and friends who have helped carry a load that is heavier than I can shoulder alone. Amy’s family invites me to family gatherings; church friends have fed me physically and spiritually; and so many people have given me space and grace to verbalize thoughts that are rambling, often incoherent, and accented with both tears and smiles. Each of these individuals are one of millions who are helping others navigate loss.

Over the past months I have been sorting through Amy’s things. Each item requires consideration of how it is to be handled. What do I do with a poem from her college English class? Or what of the handwritten letter from her dad, who was responding to her apprehension of whether she could make it in college. He affirmed how proud he was of her and how much confidence he had in her abilities, and most importantly – that he loved her. As I filter through these fragments of Amy’s life, I realize each decision is one of millions that families are wrestling with as we struggle with what to hold to and what to release.

I find myself in a space with no guardrails or absolutes. It is a place where extreme sadness and loss coexist with budding happiness and hope. This is a dark and empty void punctuated with flashes of light tinged laughter and the delightful squeals of grandchildren playing baseball. It’s where memories of the past mingle with the hope of a haze-filled future that lies just beyond the horizon.  I find that people can frustrate and disappoint me, and yet many more offer love and support.  Here, I catch the faint whiff of honeysuckles after a late afternoon thunderstorm. I am one of a million people in this space.

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 In the United States, one out of every 332 people have died after contracting Covid 19.